[KittyKat]

No it's not. The government needs to quit blaming all our ails on the recession and take a broader look if resolutions are to be achieved. The lag in jobs in America began with the middle class farms. Next came a slowdown in factory growth. Now the middle class businessman as well as working class government jobs are in trouble. It is well and good to strengthen America by strengthening the American family as Obama has been working towards but until the systemic cancer that is killing the middle class economy is addressed America as we know it is doomed.

[turtle777]

Originally Posted by KittyKat 

It's the economy stupid politicians

Fixed that for ya.

-t

[el chupacabra]

There are jobs in the country; but as our society becomes more delusional and disconnected; it devolves into a surreal system where every white American wants a high paying office or secretarial job where they can sit in front of a computer all day taking an internet-browsing break every 10 minutes. The want to be promoted every few months based on "I put my time in" rather than accomplishments/productivity. Unfortunately these jobs dont produce much needed items or services and aren't in demand.

It doesn't help that this has become so accustomed that many businesses don't want to hire white middle class Americans now because beside the fact they cant picture them doing anything other than computer work, they expect them to leave 1st chance they can. Many businesses use discriminating factors such as requiring candidates to speak Spanish in order to get the job. They argue this in order to justify hiring a cheap foreign workforce.

Its also easier to sit back and collect an unemployment check than risk losing that by finding another job that might let you go again, in which case you can't usually get unemployment again.

[ShortcutToMoncton]

So..middle-class farms drive the American economy?

Scary

[BadKosh]

Originally Posted by KittyKat 

It is well and good to strengthen America by strengthening the American family as Obama has been working towards ...

:lo l:

[Laminar]

Originally Posted by BadKosh 

:lo l:

http://forums.macnn.com/61/feedback/...3-smilies-per/

[el chupacabra]

Originally Posted by ShortcutToMoncton 

So..middle-class farms drive the American economy?

Scary

And what do YOU think should be driving it?

[besson3c]

What I'd like to know is what Republicans propose funding the Bush tax cuts with.

I've heard people advocate for keeping them since tax increases kill business growth as well as other philosophical arguments, and that's fine, but there is still a matter of funding this, and all of this "eliminate wasteful spending" rhetoric is a distraction since it won't come anywhere close to funding these tax cuts. Right here in the here and now, what do we do to fund the tax cuts?

[turtle777]

Originally Posted by besson3c 

What I'd like to know is what Republicans propose funding the Bush tax cuts with.

How about CUTTING spending for a change ?

-t

[besson3c]

Originally Posted by turtle777 

How about CUTTING spending for a change ?

-t

What gets cut?

[Uncle Skeleton]

Originally Posted by besson3c 

What gets cut?

Taxes!

[besson3c]

Originally Posted by Uncle Skeleton 

Taxes!

I love circles!

[olePigeon]

Originally Posted by Uncle Skeleton 

Taxes!

You spelled Texas wrong.

[turtle777]

Originally Posted by besson3c 

I love circles!

Fair enough. We won't cut them.

-t

[besson3c]

Originally Posted by turtle777 

Fair enough. We won't cut them.

-t

My point was that while cutting spending may eventually lead to us being able to afford the tax cuts, in the here and now we can't afford them. I was watching some video footage of Carly Fiorina being asked by Chris Wallace of Fox News how she would fund the tax cuts and she would not give a straight answer beyond rhetoric about how low taxes helps us and all of that. Fine and dandy, but politicians that either earnestly believe that a few cuts will fund this and this can be put in place immediately as to avoid increasing our debt in the short term, or do not want to damage their political career by answering a fair question... Ugh.

When your house is on fire the first thing that needs to be done is to deal with the fire however possible. Ceasing the tax cuts doesn't have to be a permanent policy, but for the short term we just can't afford them. When your house is on fire it is probably not the best time to have some ideological debate. Just put out the ****ing fire and then we can debate all of that stuff until the cows come home.

[Uncle Skeleton]

I don't understand how the debt is "house on fire" but the recession isn't. If the economy doesn't right itself, it won't matter what the tax structure is because a sinking tide lowers all ships (see the title of the thread, after all). If she/you/anyone thinks that a tax cut will (help) fix the economy, then that is the "house on fire" issue, and handing out "free" healthcare is the "ideological debate" that can wait for tomorrow. Which begs the question, how can you possibly quibble about tax cuts' effect on the deficit and also turn a blind eye on the health care thingamajigger? Isn't the latter going to dwarf the former, deficit-wise?

[besson3c]

Why is it a case of quibbling over one or the other? What makes you think there is no health care quibbling going on at the same time in my mind?

[BadKosh]

How about getting rid of useless government agencies? Dept of 'Education'. EPA, DOE, HHS for starters. The States do most of their stuff anyway.

[besson3c]

Originally Posted by BadKosh 

How about getting rid of useless government agencies? Dept of 'Education'. EPA, DOE, HHS for starters. The States do most of their stuff anyway.

Are you suggesting this will approach accounting for 4 trillion dollars?

[Uncle Skeleton]

Originally Posted by besson3c 

Why is it a case of quibbling over one or the other? What makes you think there is no health care quibbling going on at the same time in my mind?

If there is, it would have surfaced by now? I mean I know you don't want to be held accountable for past posts, but... Ok how about this, didn't I just say that the unnamed factor was larger than the named factor? Just by the fact that you went past it in favor of another target is a logical indicator that you are probably biased in favor of it. Another independent indicator is that these are established partisan issues. By badmouthing one party's ideal you can fairly be tentatively pigeonholed into the other party's platform, even absent any posting history (which let's not forget is quite large in your case and can only corroborate the stereotype; when have you ever cast a critical word towards expanding government healthcare?).

So show us your cards ok? Will you state whether or not you place as much blame for this "house on fire" on increased spending as you do on decreases in taxes? In as much as you oppose tax cuts, do you oppose the health care expansion to the same degree?

Edit: I shouldn't have bit on that.

The answer is, I'm not talking about what's in your mind only what's on the page. If you want to take a stand on healthcare I welcome you to do it. Until then, I'm only observing that the same answer would apply to both taxes and healthcare (re deficit), and of those examples why pick the smaller.

[OldManMac]

Originally Posted by turtle777 

How about CUTTING spending for a change ?

-t

How about you telling the American public that the programs they love are going to be cut. Good luck with that.

[Uncle Skeleton]

Originally Posted by OldManMac 

How about you telling the American public that the programs they love are going to be cut. Good luck with that.

Does this mean that spending can never be cut? It's hard to agree to any new spending if it is necessarily a one-way street, if they can never be un-done. I am inclined to try new things, if they sound like a good idea, but if there is no going back, on anything, then I would have to be 100% sure before agreeing, which is never the case. It doesn't sound like a good system to me.

[ShortcutToMoncton]

Originally Posted by el chupacabra 

And what do YOU think should be driving it?

I have no idea. I'm not an expert on what drives the economy. But I sure as hell know that massively over-subsidized middle-class farmers don't drive it.

greg

[besson3c]

Skeleton: if you are really anxious to learn about my positions on health care you could have combed over the many threads in the past about this issue, but it's perhaps best that you don't because they have since changed.

Right now I think that it's really almost impossible to talk about health care and to perhaps even have accurate opinions since all of this is so mired in rigid ideology. My position is a general one: we need to find what is cheapest and most effective for the largest number of people regardless of what sector(s) these solutions involve. I'm still having a hard time getting into greater specifics in my mind perhaps in part because I'm numb and feeling lazy (numb due to personal reasons in my own life right now in addition to perhaps having ODed on the issue), but also because I find it very difficult knowing what information to believe and how this relates to a bewildering number of other directly or indirectly related variables.

So, basically, for right now it's mostly that we should collectively **** off with dumb rhetoric and extreme and unreasonable sorts of ideology. Vague, I know, but this is the best answer I have for you right now.

[Uncle Skeleton]

Originally Posted by besson3c 

Right now I think that it's really almost impossible to talk about health care and to perhaps even have accurate opinions since all of this is so mired in rigid ideology.

In this day and age, isn't the national debt just as abstract a rigid ideology? I mean clearly neither side thinks it's really a pressing concern. Even if you're one of the small minority that thinks it is, nothing you can do will affect it (the best hope of affecting something that big would be to leverage one party against the other. No leverage exists big enough to overcome both parties working against it). And even if you could somehow overcome both parties' agendas to change the trend from negative to positive (reducing the debt instead of increasing it), this miraculous accomplishment would still have only a microscopic effect on the outcome (on things like interest owed or bringing it to meet the target figure), it would be an empty gesture in the short term. It would be like paying down an interest-only mortgage at a time when you're struggling just to make ends meet (iow well intentioned but dumb).

So to question one side on one issue that minorly impacts this thing that nobody really thinks is urgent, what could it possibly matter? With all that in our craw, we might as well take whatever benefit comes from lower taxes and be happy with that. Amirite?

Or if I'm missing something, please enlighten me. Cuz it kind of just sounds like an excuse to say "gotcha" to the t-party types

[besson3c]

I think that people that want to keep the Bush tax cuts need to pay for them, period, especially those what campaign on fiscal responsibility and reducing spending. That's really all I'm saying WRT the Bush tax cut issue.

I'm not sure I understand your point, but I think that this issue *is* important. For one, there is the issue of political capital. If you don't fund the tax cuts and just add this cost to your deficit you can't really campaign on fiscal responsibility in good consciousness, but if you eliminate the tax cuts you are hurting the benefactors and perhaps taking a political cut as a Republican (and you are probably taking a political hit in supporting them as a Democrat). Political capital is important during political turbulence, I would think... Appearances matter.

Secondly, having a high amount of debt makes it harder to justify certain projects and other investments that can be of benefit to your state as a politician, unless these stimulate the economy in some way.

Thirdly, as debt increases the value of our currency should decrease, right? This has geopolitical ramifications.

There are probably other factors that should be added here, but I'm not even sure I understand where you are going with this, so I'll leave it at this for now...

[Uncle Skeleton]

I'm not going anywhere with it, I already got there. The huge national debt is a foregone conclusion, so making sacrifices in order to fight it is to make sacrifices for no measurable benefit. If you want tax cut proponents to "pay for" the tax cuts the answer is easy, just nip the new health care program in the bud, problem solved.

[OldManMac]

Originally Posted by Uncle Skeleton 

Does this mean that spending can never be cut? It's hard to agree to any new spending if it is necessarily a one-way street, if they can never be un-done. I am inclined to try new things, if they sound like a good idea, but if there is no going back, on anything, then I would have to be 100% sure before agreeing, which is never the case. It doesn't sound like a good system to me.

No, it doesn't necessarily mean that. The problem, however, is that if we cut spending, whether it's at the government or private level, someone loses a job, and it tends to affect more than just that individual. That's one of the major reasons we're in the mess we're in (which isn't over by a long shot). People aren't spending. If I work for the State of Michigan (I don't), and it decides to lay me off to save money (which is happening), where do I go to find a job in the private sector, when my neighbor in the private sector is already laid off? I don't pretend to have an answer, but one thing I'm fairly certain of is that this country is in a slow, steady, decline, for a number of reasons, and it's related to corruption and inefficiencies at both the government and corporate levels. Some individuals keep repeating the same old rhetoric that the government is wasteful and inefficient (which certainly has some truth to it), but when those same people see nothing wrong with a select few getting richer and richer, while the rest of us are barely trading water, and those individuals keeping spouting their "free market" crap, I have a problem with that.

[Big Mac]

Originally Posted by besson3c 

Are you suggesting this will approach accounting for 4 trillion dollars?

You're right, besson, those programs don't account for trillions of dollars in government spending. Eliminating useless minor bureaucracies like the DOE won't get the job done - not by a long shot. This is what everyone needs to look at in order to grasp the topic:


That chart is right from the horse's mouth, btw. You see how Entitlements, of the types public/general (Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid) and government employee benefits, (together called "Mandatory" or Automatic spending) are swallowing up in Pac-Man fashion the two slices of non-automatic spending - Defense and Non-Defense "Discretionary"? How ironic it is that Defense, a Constitutional prerogative of the federal government to provide for, is labeled discreationary, whereas contemptibly unconstitutional Entitlements are labeled as Mandatory. (And non-defense discretionary amazingly includes such things as the federal courts - which in truth are truly mandatory Constitutional services of the federal government.) Also note the interest on the Federal debt, currently at a "paltry" $170B - it will balloon in a short period of time with the immense deficits we're running and the day of reckoning that will come when interest rates will inevitably rise. (With outdated spending models created prior to the BHO deficit spending binge, it was estimated that by around 2017 debt service/net interest would be more expensive than the Defense Department. That's apparently going to happen a lot sooner now.)

Do you see why this country is being destroyed by its enormous federal government and its Social(ist) Welfare State? The sad fact is we deserve to fail because we've allowed in the last 100 years such a thorough corrupting of the country and nearly complete discarding of the Constitution and our founding ideals. We deserve to go down. In truth, the American Republic probably died generations ago.

Even the great President Ronald Reagan couldn't get us back on track. He was probably our last best chance to fundamentally restore the country, but he couldn't resist big government either.

[turtle777]

America is going the way of Argentina. Once one of the richest countries in the world, squandered its wealth on socialist pipe dreams, and ended up defaulting and in high inflation.

-t

[besson3c]

What I don't understand is why some people think the only solution is to not have these programs at all. There were times in our history when our budget was balanced and these programs more or less worked, and of course, as I've preached many times, if you want to scrap a program you need to either replace it or else account for every direct *and indirect* consequence as to not shoot yourself in the foot. Sometimes shooting yourself in the foot can be quite expensive...

To answer my question one can bring up the constitution and various philosophical arguments, but to that I would say that these have to be practical as well, and include a plan from getting us from place A to place B. Right now to me practicality > ideology, because we have a surplus of the latter and a shortage of the former, IMHO.

[besson3c]

Big Mac: so, would you continue the Bush tax cuts right now?

[The Final Dakar]

Originally Posted by besson3c 

What I don't understand is why some people think the only solution is to not have these programs at all. There were times in our history when our budget was balanced and these programs more or less worked, and of course, as I've preached many times, if you want to scrap a program you need to either replace it or else account for every direct *and indirect* consequence as to not shoot yourself in the foot.

Do you have examples of these consequences you allude to?

Originally Posted by besson3c 

Big Mac: so, would you continue the Bush tax cuts right now?

That's an stupid question. In what situation do you see him supporting their expiration?

[besson3c]

Originally Posted by The Final Dakar 

Do you have examples of these consequences you allude to?

If we were to cut Medicare, for instance, i.e. it were to simply vanish, we'd have at least the potential for a greater number of personal bankruptcies, an increased strain on the E.R. rooms, these costs being passed on to us, probably in increase of crime and poverty, etc.

When one domino falls, several others usually do as well with systems this inherently complex.

That's an stupid question. In what situation do you see him supporting their expiration?

On account of not being able to afford them?

To me the argument for the tax cuts is that it will encourage business to develop and grow (including new ones), and create jobs in the process, but in cutting taxes the government has less money to spend and therefore racks up a huge debt. If you cut government programs and reduce spending, then you can also afford to cut taxes. The problem is, to me you have to do the the former before the latter if you are interested in not increasing debt. Doing the former will take years and years of change and revamping, and there has to be a plan to get us there that preferably does not make the problem worse in the interim.

I'm wondering whether my logic is flawed and how many would agree with this.

[The Final Dakar]

Originally Posted by besson3c 

If we were to cut Medicare, for instance, i.e. it were to simply vanish, we'd have at least the potential for a greater number of personal bankruptcies, an increased strain on the E.R. rooms, these costs being passed on to us, probably in increase of crime and poverty, etc.

When one domino falls, several others usually do as well with systems this inherently complex.

Ah, but therein lies the rub. If you can't factually demonstrate this to people who oppose government spending, how is anyone supposed discern realities from boogeymen?

Originally Posted by besson3c 

On account of not being able to afford them?

He wants to gut the government. There's a good chance we could afford the tax cuts under his thoughts.

[Uncle Skeleton]

Originally Posted by OldManMac 

No, it doesn't necessarily mean that.

Then when? The rest of your post describes why you wouldn't reduce government in a recession, but I already know you wouldn't do it during a boom either (because the push to do it is gone and the government wants to keep existing), so when would it ever happen? If your answer is "no not necessarily" but at the same time it will never happen, then the answer is "effectively yes."

If I work for the State of Michigan (I don't), and it decides to lay me off to save money (which is happening), where do I go to find a job in the private sector, when my neighbor in the private sector is already laid off?

The cut in public spending is supposed to allow for reducing taxes on the private sector, creating a stimulus there.

Some individuals keep repeating the same old rhetoric that the government is wasteful and inefficient (which certainly has some truth to it), but when those same people see nothing wrong with a select few getting richer and richer, while the rest of us are barely trading water, and those individuals keeping spouting their "free market" crap, I have a problem with that.

I don't see what one has to do with the other, unless you're just saying that you hold a grudge against the messenger for a message they have said in the past. Government expansion in and of itself doesn't create prosperity, the only way that happens is if the expansion is of some magic bullet that actually solves the problem.

[besson3c]

Originally Posted by The Final Dakar 

Ah, but therein lies the rub. If you can't factually demonstrate this to people who oppose government spending, how is anyone supposed discern realities from boogeymen?

I think one can, but both have to be interested in delving into this complexity and even acknowledging the notion that what they want to do might have adverse effects.

He wants to gut the government. There's a good chance we could afford the tax cuts under his thoughts.

Understand, but I want to get into process... I think we can agree that gutting the government is going to be a long, multi-phase process that won't happen overnight? What do we do in the meantime with decisions such as the renewal of these tax cuts?

[The Final Dakar]

Originally Posted by besson3c 

I think one can, but both have to be interested in delving into this complexity and even acknowledging the notion that what they want to do might have adverse effects.

I'm curious whether that complexity is even believed in.

Originally Posted by besson3c 

Understand, but I want to get into process... I think we can agree that gutting the government is going to be a long, multi-phase process that won't happen overnight? What do we do in the meantime with decisions such as the renewal of these tax cuts?

I see where you're going here. That's valid.

[besson3c]

Originally Posted by The Final Dakar 

I'm curious whether that complexity is even believed in.

That's a great question, and perhaps this is the heart of the problem.

[besson3c]

Here's another, perhaps better way of phrasing my question guys...

Pretend you're president, your advisers are saying "a decision on whether we renew these tax cuts is due Friday". I realize that a president doesn't actually decide and implement these things on his/her own without Congress, but let's pretend this decision is a one-way ticket into deciding whether this decision is something that the party is going to be committed to, and that it is deemed practical that one way or another this decision can be carried out relatively promptly.

Can you implement some massive government gutting plan/program by Friday? Assuming not, what do you do *today*? This is exactly where we're at right now with these tax cuts, there are no massive gutting of all entitlement program bills on the table, only a repeal of ObamaCare which still does not address the massive problem of health care costs, so...

Yay or nay? I'm hoping a very reluctant and unfortunate sort of acknowledgement that we can't afford the cuts right now. Part of politics seems to be agreeing to things that are practical today but you don't want to be practical tomorrow. Obama's inheritance of the Iraq war was this way - he and much of the left didn't want us there to begin with.

The fact that some on both sides seem unwilling to agree to things that are practical today but are not wished to be practical tomorrow is unfortunate. Ideology > practicality right now.

[Uncle Skeleton]

Originally Posted by besson3c 

I'm hoping a very reluctant and unfortunate sort of acknowledgement that we can't afford the cuts right now.

I don't understand what you mean by "can't afford." We can't afford waaaay more stuff that we do anyway. The "can't afford it" horse is long gone, closing the barn door now won't bring it back.

Oh yeah and why did you say "right now?" I thought the whole idea of deficit spending is you rack up a debt during a crisis and then pay it off later. Aren't we in a crisis now, so the time to worry about what we can afford is after the crisis ends?

[Big Mac]

Originally Posted by besson3c 

What I don't understand is why some people think the only solution is to not have these programs at all. There were times in our history when our budget was balanced and these programs more or less worked, and of course, as I've preached many times, if you want to scrap a program you need to either replace it or else account for every direct *and indirect* consequence as to not shoot yourself in the foot. Sometimes shooting yourself in the foot can be quite expensive...

I have to keep in mind in talking to you that politics and economics are not your fields of expertise, to be kind. Yes, besson, we would indeed be better off, far far better off, not having these programs at all. Or do you fail to comprehend the simple point that some small portion of society doing poorly due to circumstances in or out of their control is infinitely better than the whole government collapsing and failing under the weight of a gigantic, untenable Social(ist) Welfare monstrosity?

To answer my question one can bring up the constitution and various philosophical arguments, but to that I would say that these have to be practical as well, and include a plan from getting us from place A to place B. Right now to me practicality > ideology, because we have a surplus of the latter and a shortage of the former, IMHO.

I have the practical solution. Terminate the failed, unconstitutional Progressive/Quasi-Socialist nightmares, and then a tremendous amount of weight will be lifted off the economy. You'll be able to cut taxes way down, invigorating the economy in ways not seen since President Coolidge. Businesses and consumers would have much more money to spend (especially poorer people who no longer have substantial amounts of their paychecks robbed in the name of Social Security), and governments would no longer be crowding out the private sector for loans.

Originally Posted by besson3c 

Big Mac: so, would you continue the Bush tax cuts right now?

I'd reform the whole tax system, abolishing the IRS. There would be no reason for such high, punitive taxation if the federal and state governments were slashed down to sane levels.

Originally Posted by The Final Dakar 

Do you have examples of these consequences you allude to?

That's a very good question for him. He apparently thinks the sky would fall if we rolled back ObamaCare, the Great (Sham) Society and the New (Socialist) Deal.

That's an stupid question. In what situation do you see him supporting their expiration?

Taxes are screwed across the board. I would slash government down to size and completely reform taxation. It would be a whole different landscape.

Originally Posted by besson3c 

If we were to cut Medicare, for instance, i.e. it were to simply vanish, we'd have at least the potential for a greater number of personal bankruptcies, an increased strain on the E.R. rooms, these costs being passed on to us, probably in increase of crime and poverty, etc.

If we were to end Medicare we'd have something resembling a free market again, and prices would come down dramatically. To make people like you happy, besson, we could engineer a much cheaper and more effective replacement for Medicare in the form of HSAs and high deductible catastrophic plans, which would take the burden off of the treasury and discontinue the perverse incentive that many aged people have for overusing and abusing health care services. By subsidizing care to the extent Medicare does, removing the patient from having to care about how much of an impact he or she is having financially on the system, you naturally promote abuse of the system. The problem is that people on your side of the fence don't care about the real world financial implications of enormous government because you're almost entirely driven by the emotional argument instead of the rational one. We live in a real world, besson. People like you live in a fairy tale land in which it's fine to ignore economic realities; money, deficits and debt don't mean anything, and rich people can be taxed and exploited endlessly because success makes them evil.

When one domino falls, several others usually do as well with systems this inherently complex.

Well, either unconstitutional government programs are eliminated by our own doing or the whole system collapses because well meaning yet very ignorant people have no clue about economic realities. This corrupt quasi-Socialist system you love is coming to an end, besson. Your advocacy of the status quo promotes a world-wide financial melt-down and unimaginable carnage. My solution, which would be despised by those champions of enormous government Statism, would preserve the country, restore our liberty and in time restore the values of Americans to our founding ideals that made us the greatest, freest, most prosperous country on earth. Progressivism/Quasi-Socialism certainly didn't make us great, besson. It's time for you to free your mind, if you have the opportunity to do so.

To me the argument for the tax cuts is that it will encourage business to develop and grow (including new ones), and create jobs in the process, but in cutting taxes the government has less money to spend and therefore racks up a huge debt. If you cut government programs and reduce spending, then you can also afford to cut taxes. The problem is, to me you have to do the the former before the latter if you are interested in not increasing debt. Doing the former will take years and years of change and revamping, and there has to be a plan to get us there that preferably does not make the problem worse in the interim.

You're making things too difficult. Cut taxes without cutting government (actually doing the opposite, as Bush & Obama have) and you have big and then massive deficits. Here's the secret: Slash government and cut taxes all at the same time, and don't tell me it can't be done. Then you have three major outcomes:

1. Aversion of a financial collapse of the entire civilized world;
2. Restoration of liberty, along with an imposition of increased personal responsibility;
3. A lot of pissed of leftists (Communists, Socialists, Statists, including a majority of the currently elected DNC members) who will want to go to war because they're being taken out of power

Originally Posted by besson3c 

Here's another, perhaps better way of phrasing my question guys... Pretend you're president, your advisers are saying "a decision on whether we renew these tax cuts is due Friday". I realize that a president doesn't actually decide and implement these things on his/her own without Congress, but let's pretend this decision is a one-way ticket into deciding whether this decision is something that the party is going to be committed to, and that it is deemed practical that one way or another this decision can be carried out relatively promptly.

besson, the spectrum of your thinking is far too narrow. The Bush tax cuts are small ball. Whether they expire, are renewed or renewed partially, it will make very little difference to the impending financial train wreck coming the world's way because Socialism and its welfare state mentality infected the United States many decades ago.

Yay or nay? I'm hoping a very reluctant and unfortunate sort of acknowledgement that we can't afford the cuts right now. Part of politics seems to be agreeing to things that are practical today but you don't want to be practical tomorrow. Obama's inheritance of the Iraq war was this way - he and much of the left didn't want us there to begin with.

And that's why you fail, besson. You think the federal government has a revenue problem with the Bush tax cuts in place. You think the Bush tax cuts are the problem. But in truth the feds are robbing us very well under the current tax scheme. The thing that you don't understand is that even if you let the cuts expire, it won't make a dent in the country's massive SPENDING problem, especially under President Barack Hussein Obama. The federal government has corrupted itself especially in the 20th Century by taking on immense obligations, promising the people far too much from the Treasury in return for their votes. The Democratic Party is primarily and overwhelmingly guilty of this. Generations have grown up expecting and demanding a Nanny State. The politicians have indulged that desire because promising goodies to moronic masses gets them reelected and well protected. And now the system is reaching critical mass and is preparing to implode in the coming years.

And by the way, the Constitution isn't just philosophy or ideology. It's the Highest Law of the Land. If you want to disregard it that's your prerogative, but those of us who care about laws - the rule of law - and believe laws keep us free from the tyranny of corrupt, evil men, do care a whole lot. We wouldn't be having this discussion if the Constitutional limitations on government were enforced. It's not just abstract theory for us.

[The Final Dakar]

Originally Posted by Big Mac 

That's a very good question for him. He apparently thinks the sky would fall if we rolled back ObamaCare, the Great (Sham) Society and the New (Socialist) Deal.

...and here's why I can't take you seriously. I'm surprised you don't call it HusseinCare.

[Big Mac]

Maybe I should. It's fine if you don't want to take me seriously, Dakar. I don't take you seriously. But when I'm discussing is very serious, and I call a spade a spade. If two descriptive words I put in parentheses are enough for you to write off a full post, then I'll assume you're making excuses for not wanting to take on the merits of what I have to write.

[The Final Dakar]

Originally Posted by Big Mac 

But when I'm discussing is very serious, and I call a spade a spade.

Calling a spade a spade is calling it the New Deal the New Deal. Let's not pretend venom laced interjections aren't occurring.

[Big Mac]

The New Deal was a Quasi-Socialist package of unconstitutional programs that allowed for a creeping Socialism into the country that has brought us to the heavily Socialized conditions we have today, in which the feds are taking over health care, banks, the auto industry, giant insurance companies, etc. Government is now the biggest employer around - are you going to argue that's not Socialism? Because if you don't think that's Socialism, or if you don't see the linkage I'm creating between the New Deal and what we're dealing with today, then I'm sorry but you're being willfully obtuse. The truth hurts I guess.

[Uncle Skeleton]

The history question thread wandered in here and threw up

[Big Mac]

"Those who don't learn from history. . ."

"A democracy cannot exist as a permanent form of government. It can only exist until the majority discovers it can vote itself largess out of the public treasury."
-Attributed to Alexander Tytler

"The trouble with Socialism is that eventually you run out of other people's money." -Thatcher, shortened quotation

[The Final Dakar]

Originally Posted by Big Mac 

I'm sorry but you're being willfully obtuse.

A. No you're not
B. You missed my point completely. You lack the ability to discuss the subject in a straight-forward manner. You constantly have to color topics with your editorialising. How about you let your arguments stand on their own without the scare words?

[Big Mac]

Originally Posted by The Final Dakar 

A. No you're not

I'm sorry for you if you can't see these things. You're right that I'm not apologizing, but I feel sorry for you.

B. You missed my point completely. You lack the ability to discuss the subject in a straight-forward manner. You constantly have to color topics with your editorialising. How about you let your arguments stand on their own without the scare words?

Maybe I feel the need to editorialize a bit because you and besson aren't getting it if I don't use editorial language. You may not get it even if I use the strongest language possible, but I have to try to get through to you. My first post put everything on the table in a fairly matter-of-fact way, and besson ignored the point completely, so yes I felt the need to make my point in a stronger way. I didn't know neutral, scholarly treatments were expected in this forum, but beyond that I expect a smart guy like you to be able to understand me and debate the substance of my argument even if you don't like the fact that I sometimes use partisan language. I suppose I'm expecting too much.